Thursday, October 26, 2017

Book of Spells for Zylarthen Released!

It's been a long time coming, but I've finally released Book of Spells, the 1st supplement for Seven Voyages of Zylarthen.It's available in booklet form and as an "extra" in the also newly released Zylarthen Electronic Edition, which consolidates revised versions of the first four volumes in a bookmarked 336 page PDF file.Here's an excerpt from the foreword:

Book of Spells, the first supplement for SEVEN VOYAGES of ZYLARTHEN, almost doubles the number of spells in the ZYLARTHEN catalog from 150 to 296.

Part of the idea was to continue the process of “re-imagining” the original fantasy adventure game through the midpoint of its fourth year, at least for spells. Thus, some of the “new” spells will be familiar.

Many of them were originally designed for a particular player-character class not available in ZYLARTHEN, although its more sinister non-player character relative survives (see Vol. 2 under “D”). Our own view is that the spells were wonderful, but the player-class itself was limiting. We think they work better if they simply expand the choices for all Magic-Users.

We also somewhat redefined the ZYLARTHEN Witch and High Priest classes. Both now have unique lists of spells—or “powers” in the case of High Priests—the majority of them being new to the universe of ZYLARTHEN as well as the original fantasy adventure game. We feel that the Witch spells make Witches more Witch-like, and the High Priest powers make High Priests more . . . perhaps alien is the right word.

In the process of conceiving Book of Spells we’ve also slightly rewritten many of the spells in Vol. 3 and changed the level of a few of them to better comport with the range of the expanded list. The duration for most spells is now defined in terms of “rounds” (10 to a turn) or “turns” (6 to an hour), as opposed to the more elastic scheme given in the original.

Spells and powers are listed in alphabetical order. All are fully compatible with ZYLARTHEN as first presented.

Revised rules for movement and time, tables for age and aging for player-characters (especially useful when assessing the effects of attacks by Ghosts and the like) and item saving throws (for all sorts of unpleasant situations) have also been provided. Finally, there is an optional rule for increasing the damage rolls for high-level player characters—if the players or referee feel that the original ZYLARTHEN scheme places them at a disadvantage against higher-level monsters with multiple dice of damage.

I'll be going into a bit more detail on what I did in Book of Spells, as well as discussing the Electronic Edition in subsequent posts.

I'm happy with the results, and I hope you will be too. If you would like to purchase either product (just in time for Halloween!), you can currently find them at the Zylarthen page on Lulu. (The Zylarthen box to the right will also bring you there.) But this time I also intend to offer both products at two other sites as well.

Cheers! And may you always find yourself upwind from a White Puff Ball spell.